Issues
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Cover image
Cover Image
Cover: Confocal micrograph of a pluteus-stage sea urchin embryo. The hindgut is in the centre. Shown are plasma membranes (yellow), a fluorescent dye (blue) used to track ATP-binding cassette (ABC) transporter activity, and pigment cells (red) that express the transporter ABCC5a, which is required for hindgut invagination. See Research article by Shipp et al. on p. 3537.
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IN THIS ISSUE
SPOTLIGHT
An interview with Mike Levine
Summary: Mike Levine was awarded the 2015 Edwin Grant Conklin Medal and, at this year's SDB meeting, we spoke to Mike about his career and his research.
REVIEW
Heparan sulfate proteoglycans: a sugar code for vertebrate development?
Summary: This Review article examines the role of heparan sulfate proteoglycans in vertebrate development and explores the concept of an instructive 'sugar code' for modulating development.
STEM CELLS AND REGENERATION
Dynamic transcriptional symmetry-breaking in pre-implantation mammalian embryo development revealed by single-cell RNA-seq
Highlighted article: Partitioning errors in the zygote, modulated by embryonic transcription, give rise to the unequal distribution of lineage specifiers between blastomeres that subsequently drives lineage specification.
Lin-28 promotes symmetric stem cell division and drives adaptive growth in the adult Drosophila intestine
Highlighted article: Lin-28 boosts insulin signaling in adult Drosophila intestinal progenitors in response to nutrients, adjusting the rate of symmetric renewal of stem cells and driving intestinal tissue growth.
LIF supports primitive endoderm expansion during pre-implantation development
Summary: LIF, the cytokine central for ESC self-renewal, supports heterogeneous mouse ESC cultures and early embryo development by stimulating primitive endoderm expansion and paracrine loops, and by blocking epiblast differentiation.
Trithorax regulates systemic signaling during Drosophila imaginal disc regeneration
Summary: The chromatin modifier Trithorax regulates a negative feedback loop that controls JNK signaling and Insulin-like Peptide 8 expression in damaged Drosophila imaginal discs.
RESEARCH REPORT
A non-signaling role of Robo2 in tendons is essential for Slit processing and muscle patterning
Summary: Robo2 is required in tendons to restrict Slit distribution by promoting its cleavage into a non-diffusible Slit-N, affecting muscle elongation towards tendons in Drosophila embryos.
RESEARCH ARTICLES
Revising the embryonic origin of thyroid C cells in mice and humans
Highlighted article: Mouse thyroid C cell precursors arise in foregut endoderm, and not the neural crest, disproving the current concept of a neural crest origin of thyroid neuroendocrine cells.
Epigenetic regulation of Atoh1 guides hair cell development in the mammalian cochlea
Highlighted article: Levels of histone H3 methylation and acetylation control the expression of Atoh1, a key regulator of hair cell differentiation, during inner ear development in mice.
ABCC5 is required for cAMP-mediated hindgut invagination in sea urchin embryos
Summary: The ATP-binding cassette (ABC) transporter ABCC5 transports cAMP from mesoderm cells to control late invagination of the sea urchin hindgut, revealing a novel developmental role for an ABC transporter.
Polarized Rac-dependent protrusions drive epithelial intercalation in the embryonic epidermis of C. elegans
Summary: Basolateral protrusive activity, and not apical constriction, drives cell intercalation in C. elegans embryos and is regulated by Rac/RhoG and WAVE/WASP.
Allorecognition, via TgrB1 and TgrC1, mediates the transition from unicellularity to multicellularity in the social amoeba Dictyostelium discoideum
Summary: TgrB1 and TgrC1 - the molecules that mediate allorecognition in D. discoideum - also control the integration of individual cells into a unified developing organism, acting as a gating step for multicellularity.
A germ cell determinant reveals parallel pathways for germ line development in Caenorhabditis elegans
Summary: The chromatin-associated protein XND-1 is identified as a key regulator of a novel pathway for primordial germ cell differentiation in C. elegans.
TECHNIQUES AND RESOURCES
4D atlas of the mouse embryo for precise morphological staging
Summary: This comprehensive developmental dataset, which combines optical projection tomography and image registration methods, provides a new and powerful staging system for mouse embryos.
Large-scale live imaging of adult neural stem cells in their endogenous niche
Summary: This methodology permits long-term imaging and tracking of NSCs in the adult zebrafish telencephalic neurogenic niche, allowing the frequency, distribution and modes of NSC divisions to be analyzed.
Tracking and transforming neocortical progenitors by CRISPR/Cas9 gene targeting and piggyBac transposase lineage labeling
Summary: The CRISPR/Cas9 system is used to target three tumor suppressor genes (PTEN, NF1 and P53), alone and in combination with piggyBac transposase lineage marking, to analyze their function in the developing mouse brain.
CORRECTIONS
ARTICLES OF INTEREST IN OTHER COB JOURNALS
From Journal of Cell Science
Development presents…

Development is delighted to host a webinar series showcasing the latest developmental biology and stem cell research. The webinars are held each month with talks from postdocs applying for independent positions as part of our Pathway to Independence programme. Visit Development presents... on the Node to see which stimulating topics are coming up in the next few months.
Meet our 2025 Pathway to Independence (PI) fellows

We are delighted to announce our third cohort of PI fellows - researchers whom we will be supporting as they transition from postdoc to Principal Investigator. Read about the eight talented fellows chosen, whom we're excited to be working with as they navigate the job market.
A case for broadening our view of mechanism in developmental biology

In this Perspective, B. Duygu Özpolat and colleagues survey researchers on their views on what it takes to infer mechanism in developmental biology. They examine what factors shape our idea of what we mean by ‘mechanism’ and suggest a path forward that embraces a broad outlook on the diversity of studies that advance knowledge in our field.
Browse by subject
![Development logo - Browse by subject: Explore Development's content, now easily accessible by subject area. The ad has a black background with three vibrant scientific images: a developing embryo on the left, a green plant-like structure in the center, and a gastruloid (a circular cell with a bright pink center and blue outer ring) on the right. [Blue button: browse content].](https://cob.silverchair-cdn.com/ImageLibrary/Development/Snippets/2025_05_Dev_Browse-by-subject_600x230_Snippet.png?versionId=8993)
From cardiovascular development and regeneration to tissue engineering and organoids, Development’s browse by subject archive allows you to access the latest papers (from late 2024 onwards) on a particular field of interest. In addition to our curated subject collections, these subject pages allow readers to browse a broader range of papers organised by topic.